The "lost symbol" is not fact. FACT!

This post may contain spoilers. Scattered spoilers because I am not going to review the book periodically.

I have lasted longer than most when it comes to Dan Brown. Yes his stories are basically all carbon copies but its a good story right? The pages turn quite quickly, helped by page long chapters and the characters are wonderfully one dimensional and simple to understand. I thought this was all I needed, I was wrong.

With both The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons I enjoyed the story. I enjoyed the conspiricies, the locations, the mad rush against impossible deadlines and the occasional threats faced by the characters. The Angels and Demons twist even surprised me.

With Lost Symbol I did not have a care in the world for any of the characters, the conspiricies, the locations and the mad rush was muted and pathetic partly because the actual reason for the rush is not revealed until the first last minute, when it is also miraculously stopped. Who saw that coming!

Brown also attempts to present all the theory, religion and science as fact. Techncially yes, everything he mentions exists. His referencing of it suggests he spent rather too long researching on wikipedia but the theories exist. My my main issue with this novel is with noetics.

Now Noetics is a science, yes. There are some people who believe it, yes. But there is no proof of it. It is just a theory and a wild one at that and far too much of the novel is focused on trying to make you believe it is real. After all, why begin with the fact statement if everything you write is a like of jumped up, fictional drivel?

Oh, and the twist, if you can call it that.

The only reason it might not be obvious is that the character lies to himself in his own internal narration. There is no reason for him to do this storywise, its just a poor attempt to hide the truth from the reader.

This will be the last book I read by Mr Dan Brown. They work better as films anyway, which does not say much for the contents of the books.

A higher force?

I am not a religious man. Those of you that know me will know I am in fact a steadfast atheist. As time goes on though I increasingly am beginning to believe in a some driving force, something akin to fate that affects my life each and everyday.

I am talking about Sods Law

This is in fact not even my first blog entry about sods law (although you may have to go back a bit, back in blogs in fact), I regularly fall afoul of it and today was no different.

Each morning I catch the 8:35 bus to work. Some mornings it has been late, and so this morning rather than leave myself 10-15 minutes I decided I would leave at 8:25 leaving myself 10 minutes for a walk that takes at slowest speed 5.
I admit to not even being particularly surprised when at 8:29 I watched the bus speed past with me still 200m or so from the stop. I sprinted and just reached the bus as it pulled away.

If the driver knew how to use wing mirrors he was clearly just feeling vindictive. After another sprint and a deviation from the bus route I reached the stop and caught the bus.

Later on I was at work waiting to hear back from companies, it had been a relatively slow morning so I decided to have my lunch break. I went downstairs heated up leftover chinese and headed back upstairs. At exactly that moment my email went *ping* and I received not one but two responses. Halting from eating my lunch I replied to each and continued eating. As I went to get myself a drink and a yoghurt, the phone rang, and I reverted from lunch to business mode. It was then I noticed that my phone was dying.

I finished the conversation and looked for a usb cable that had until that day been sitting in my office, it had gone. Cursing I thought up a quick alternative and set up a voicemail directing people to call my other phone. No sooner had I done this than my other phone beeped to tell me it was dying too. Cursing some more I rang my boss, explained the situation and headed home where the charger would be.

Naturally I received no further phone calls over the afternoon.

Now of course there are logical explanations for nearly all these happenings
1. companies contacted me in their lunch break, when THEY had spare time
2. the guy who rang was in response to an email I had sent
3. My boss had taken the camera which used the usb to develop photos
4. both my phones were low on battery because I had been out the night before and therefore had not had much chance to charge them.
5. And I had been using it a lot thus causing the battery to run down

Alternatively some higher power simply want to screw with me. It is after all, a lot of coincedences.

Ducking and Weaving

We as a race seem to want to avoid responsibility.

The phrase "It wasn't me" is one we have all used at one time or another. Yet when companies do it, it can really become tiresome. Trying to shirk responsibility is never going to be the best approach to a satisfied customer. There are some businesses where unsatisfied customers are more dangerous than others and it is always surprising when such businesses fail to understand this.

One such business is the property/lettings market. Potential tenants are quick to ask their friends for opinions and online reviews are perhaps paid attention to more than most. Even one damning review can put off a potential buyer. After all, there is very little room for error.

When I began looking for a flat I was quick to ask the opinion of my friends. One stated, "avoid x, they have messed us around" so I did not even bother to look. As easy as that my potential custom is gone.

Yet here I am a week on from the discovery of a problem and my new letting agency is yet to solve it. They have been quick to admit their mistake, but what they intend to do about it has not been so easily forthcoming.
To explain, myself and my girlfriend were informed by 2 separate agents that an active phone line was available in the property. A week on from agreeing to take the said property it is revealed this was a lie. They have since admitted they are in error but have not suggested they will solve the issue.

Ignorance is not a valid excuse.

I am beginning to tire of their ducking and weaving in an attempt to somehow shift the blame, or at least the cost of dealing with the issue. You could get a dongle and then you would not need a phone line was one such attempt. I could, yes, but I want a God Damn phone line.

The interesting thing in all this is that they have admitted we are by no means at fault. It is possible the tenant is at fault for failing to keep an active phone line, it is possible the agency is at fault for failing to penalise a previous tenant for making off with the number and thus leaving the line totally disconnected.

It is certain that the agents who showed us the flat are at fault for providing false information. The fact that they were misinformed is fairly irrelevant. It is their job to get it right and failure to do so makes them culpable.

At the moment they are looking into their options and trying to avoid blame. I am also considering my options, and how much damage I can and should do them as they continue to fail to accept responsibility. Whether we have a legal case due to misrepresentation is one thing. (and early impressions suggest we do) Naming them in this rather damning review is another thing altogether. Should they solve this satisfactorily I will say so, otherwise may I advise anyone reading this to avoid letting a property with The Flat Agency!